An Easter Egg Hunt
by vicvic221
Summary: Raleigh introduces Loki to one of the most popular Easter traditions: Easter Egg Hunts. One-shot. Loki/OC.


**Disclaimer:** This story is based on the characters created and owned by Stan Lee, Larry Lieber, and Jack Kirby, among other various writers, and Marvel Entertainment, LLC. There is no copyright infringement intended and there is no monetary gain being made off of this work.

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_I received a prompt on Tumblr requesting some Raleigh/Loki action relating to Easter and this is the end result. I do hope you guys like it. :) Hope that everyone had a nice holiday weekend even if you weren't celebrating!_

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**An Easter Egg Hunt**

"So on Christmas, Midgardian children believe that a fat elf shimmies down the chimney…and on Easter they believe that a magical, talking rabbit comes to leave them sweets?" Loki's face twisted as he finished speaking, leaving him with an expression of utter confusion and loss.

Raleigh smiled at him. "Yes," she nodded. "And if you don't have a chimney then Santa can turn himself into dust and float under your door."

"That is the single most ridiculous thing that I've ever heard."

"How is it any more ridiculous than _you_ changing _your_ shape?" she demanded, her eyes narrowing slightly.

"Because elves can't change their shape, yet alone turn into dust," said Loki, "and rabbits certainly can't talk. That's anthropomorphising."

"Well, _there's_ a ten dollar word if I ever heard one."

He rolled his eyes and then leaned back in his seat. "You can't deny that it's ridiculous, Raleigh."

"Can too," she sniffed, before she picked up her coffee cup and drained it of its contents. "Come on, we've got to go. We're going to be late."

"I've not finished eating," Loki told her, gesturing to his plate, which was still half filled with his breakfast.

"Get a box," she replied dismissively as she waved at their waitress. "Bring it along."

"Or we could just be late," he suggested snidely. "I don't see what the fuss is about, honestly."

"It's an Easter egg hunt," Raleigh said, her eyes widening. "It's _tradition!"_

"It isn't even your child that's hunting eggs, Raleigh," Loki complained. The waitress arrived and he quickly fell silent, allowing Raleigh to request their bill. When she'd received it and the waitress departed, he continued, "Have you even met the thing?"

"Steve and Mariah invited us to come and I said yes because that's the right thing to do when someone invites you," Raleigh told him without looking up from the check. "Tony and Pepper are going, too."

"This is idiotic."

"No, this is Easter." She gestured towards his food, "Finish what you can while I go to pay this."

"Raleigh—"

"No, Loki."

"But—"

"Stop talking, start eating." And with that, she slid out of the booth and headed toward the diner's counter.

* * *

Midgardian children were annoying.

Loki couldn't be certain as to when he'd decided this—perhaps it was before this particular and unusually warm Sunday, perhaps not—but there would be no time after his first Easter Sunday with Raleigh that he did not believe this to be true. They were annoying. It was a very simple fact.

It wasn't that he didn't like children—to tell the truth, he really didn't care either way about the things. He never had.

And it wasn't that they were Midgardians—after all, Raleigh was a Midgardian and she was generally tolerable.

He couldn't quite put his finger on what it was about them that annoyed him, but as he stood beside Raleigh under the bright sun, he couldn't help but think that there was absolutely nothing to them that was of merit.

They were incredibly loud, generally obnoxious, and had almost no tact whatsoever. And then, of course, there were the few who seemed to have rolled in mud before coming to hunt for oddly coloured eggs.

Humans were so stupid.

"Is it over yet?" he asked Raleigh out of the corner of his mouth, feeling more and more disgruntled.

"They haven't found all of the eggs yet," Raleigh answered. "There's supposed to be a hundred of them. Once they find all one hundred eggs, it's over."

"But what if they _can't_ find all one hundred eggs?" Loki prompted as he took a step back to avoid a filthy little boy who went careening past, shrieking loudly as he waved a bright purple egg in the air.

Raleigh glanced over at him, the corners of her mouth quirking in amusement. "You're so bad with kids."

"You didn't answer my question."

"Have you ever actually interacted with a child, Lo—Luke?" she amended, raising her eyebrows. "Seriously, have you? They don't bite."

Loki's eyes narrowed as he scanned the open area of the park again, watching the little savages. "I believe that to be debatable."

"Jo's a sweet kid," Raleigh continued on as if she hadn't heard him. "You could at least _try_ to be nice to her for Steve and Mariah's sake."

He just barely managed to suppress a snort. "I have no need to do anything for either of them or their sakes."

"Then could you at least do it for me?" she asked, looking over at him sharply. "I like kids."

"Then I hope you have a small army of them. I imagine you won't like them much then."

"No, I imagine I'll be dead if I have that many children actually," Raleigh deadpanned. "Please, Loki?"

He grimaced, but then nodded. "Fine," he said. "I don't see why you believe we have to be nice to other people's children though."

"Because it's the right thing to do," Raleigh told him tersely. "And look," she pointed at the little brunette girl that was making her way towards them, "Jo's coming over here. Be _nice."_

"I don't think that's possible," Loki grumbled as he folded his arms across his chest. The things he subjected himself to for the woman...

"What was that?"

"I was just saying 'of course,' darling," he said, flashing her a broad smile. Raleigh pursed her lips at him, but instead of continuing their conversation, she turned her attention to the little girl that had just arrived, and said: "Hey, you! How's the egg hunt going?"

He watched as Raleigh crouched down, exchanging pleasantries with the little girl who seemed to be very out of breath but very excited about all of the eggs she had found so far. She wasn't as horrendous as the other little beasts, Loki decided after a few moments. She was clean and she was well-dressed, which already put her above her peers. She wore a simple white dress with black polka dots with a cardigan—which, surprisingly hadn't been sullied in her quest for any of the eggs which filled her purple wicker basket—and her light brown hair was pinned back from her freckled face.

She was an oddly pleasant thing, with animated features and good manners. Even more interestingly, she seemed to be quite smart. After showing Raleigh her cache, which the woman ooh'd and ahh'd over appreciatively, she began to explain the importance of the numbers on the eggs.

"Well, there's prizes," the little girl said, showing Raleigh an orange egg with the number 76 scrawled on it. "The man said that when you go to show them your eggs at the end, the ones with numbers get big prizes."

"Really?" Raleigh's eyebrows shot up. "That's neat. Did you get to see any of the prizes?"

Jo paused for a moment, thinking, before she said, "Yeah. They laid them out on a table up there." She gestured in the general direction of the table from which a steady stream of announcements had been coming.

"Did you see any you really liked?" Raleigh asked her.

"A couple." The little girl smiled bashfully, "Mommy said that her and Steve would help me look, but we couldn't find the one I wanted."

"No?"

"No." Jo shook her head, and then said, "I looked _everywhere_ for it, and I couldn't find it."

Raleigh smiled. "Well, did you look over here?"

Oh for the love of all that was holy in the Nine Realms. He was going to strangle Raleigh.

Jo's cheeks turned pink and she mumbled, "No…I asked Mom if I could come see you and Luke, but she said I shouldn't bother you guys."

"Oh?" Loki said, breaking his long silence to agree with Mariah's sentiment. "Well, your mother really is—"

"—just too polite," Raleigh interrupted. She reached out, gingerly tucking a strand of hair behind the girl's ear. "We'd love to help you look over here, you know."

Loki spluttered: "Raleigh—"

"Really?!" Jo asked excitedly.

"Really," said Raleigh with a nod. She looked up at Loki, adding, "Right, Luke?"

He glanced between the woman and the child, debating the merit of swearing at Raleigh right now. It was bad enough that he'd been dragged here to watch the little wretches kill each other for eggs soaked in dye, but now he had to help one of the little monsters?

"Please, Luke?" Jo asked, and before Raleigh could reach out to stop her, she had taken a few steps toward the god and slipped her very small hand into his much larger one. With a surprising amount of strength for one so little, she tugged on his hand and said, "I promise it's just one egg! Pretty please?!"

Loki stared at her, caught somewhere between revulsion and shock. He'd made it blatantly clear to the little girl—when none of the other humans were listening, of course—that he did not want to be touched by her. And yet here she was, peering up at him with her large doe eyes and a winsome smile.

However, rather than ripping away from her with an angry response, he found himself smiling and he heard himself say, quite agreeably, "I suppose that we could have a look."

"Great!" Jo's face lit up and she began to tug him toward the bushes, carrying on eagerly, "It's 49! If we find it, I get a _Harry Potter_ book!"

"Really?" Raleigh asked the girl as she caught Loki's eye. She tilted her head to the side and mouthed, 'You're so cute.'

Loki scowled at her, and, in a voice that was loud enough for Raleigh alone to hear, said, "You will pay."

She smirked, taking a few steps closer until she was at his side, and then whispered, "Play nice and you'll get something very sweet. I'll make sure of it."

"Oh, really now?" Loki teased, forgetting to keep his voice low.

"Really what?" Jo piped up as she came to an abrupt halt and nearly tripped Loki in the process. She swivelled around to face the two adults curiously.

"Uhm," Raleigh began dumbly, her cheeks turning a very familiar shade of red, "we—"

"We were just saying that we're very surprised you haven't read all of the _Harry Potter_ books already," Loki supplied smoothly.

"Oh," said Jo. "Mom reads them to me and I've seen all of the movies, but I don't own all the books yet."

"And which one is it that you win if you find the egg?" Loki asked her, deciding to swallow his pride and play along. He could stomach being affable if there was the promise of sex.

"The third one," Jo replied, then said, "Luke, how come your hand's cold?"

He stiffened, and out of the corner of his eye he could see Raleigh's face drain of colour. Still focusing on the not-so-subtle innuendo, Loki explained, "I just have poor circulation. My hands are always cold."

"Oh, that's cool," Jo said, before she pulled away and crouched down, beginning to search the bushes for egg 49.

Dumbfounded, both Raleigh and Loki simply stared at the child as she hunted through the shrubs. Eventually, the little girl turned to look at them, and asked, "Well, aren't ya gonna help me?"

Raleigh laughed. "Sorry," she said hurriedly, and she motioned for Loki to follow suit as she headed down the row of bushes to search for the mythical egg.

"You all right?" she whispered to Loki.

"I'm fine," he murmured, picking through the branches of the bush. He glanced over at Jo and then back at Raleigh, saying, "I could use a pick-me-up, though."

She swatted his shoulder. "We can't just leave her alone!"

"Why ever not?" Loki asked, his brow furrowing.

"Because she's a very cute little girl and this is a very big city and there are a lot of very creepy people out there who could hurt her and might try to if we leave her alone!" Raleigh hissed at him through clenched teeth. "Don't be thick!"

"Children her age are being trained to use bows on Asgard, Raleigh," Loki said dismissively. "Five minutes."

She scoffed.

"What?"

"You're being awfully generous."

"How so?"

"You definitely won't last five minutes. More like two."

"That is hardly—"

"Hardly what we should be talking about with a child so close by," Raleigh said, cutting him off. She gave him a pointed look and then gestured at Jo, "Go help her. She can't reach whatever it is she's found."

Loki sighed, but acquiesced. Unfortunately, Jo hadn't found 49 but rather a simple teal egg with a strange pattern of triangles cut into the colours. She took the egg and thanked him, then asked, "Who's your favourite _Harry Potter_ character?"

"Erm," Loki struggled to think of an answer as he followed after her along the row of hedges, looking through them for any sign of a neon coloured egg bearing a large '49.' After a few moments of thought, he kneeled down on the hard earth and answered, "Sirius Black."

"I like Hermione."

"Is that right?" he asked, trying to mimic the same enthusiasm that Raleigh had shown for the girl's interests earlier.

"Yeah," Jo nodded, continuing on as she knelt down beside him, peering under the bushes with him. "She's super smart and brave and a lot like me…"

"Mm-hm," Loki murmured, still feigning interest. Of all the times that he couldn't have his magic…. What he wouldn't give to just conjure the damn egg out of thin air. His mind was constantly wandering back to Raleigh's promise. He couldn't help but think of how he would like nothing better than to have her pinned to the wall of his bedroom, dragging his lips along the hollow of her throat as she moaned his name. _That_ was how Sunday was meant to be spent.

Play nice, he told himself. Play nice with the little human.

"Are you like Sirius?" Jo asked, abruptly ending her tangent on the virtues of Hermione Granger.

He looked up at the little girl and then sat back on his heels, considering her question. "Sometimes," he said after several moments of deep thought. "But not always."

"What do you mean?"

"I haven't always done the right thing or been the best son," Loki told her, trying to choose his words carefully. "I've gotten in plenty of trouble over the years, too." He hesitated, watching as the child mimicked his actions and levelled her gaze with his own. And then, for whatever reason, he admitted to her, "I suppose I'm more like Lupin than Sirius, though."

Jo smiled. "I like Lupin," she told him. "He's really neat. He's a werewolf and he's nice. He gives people chocolate when they're sad because chocolate makes you feel better."

"Well, I'm not so nice," Loki chuckled.

The girl's brow pulled together in confusion. "Then why are you like each other?"

"We're alike because there's a part of ourselves that we're not proud of and that we wish we could make go away," said Loki. He didn't know where the words were coming from or why he was telling any of this to a strange child, but he didn't stop. "And we feel like if people knew us, and what we really are, that they'd hate us."

For a long while, Jo was silent. The other children continued to race around them, hunting for eggs and calling to each other or their siblings and parents; Raleigh had moved in the opposite direction, searching through the brush as she went. After a while, Loki began to think that he'd answered the question in a far too complicated way for the child to possibly understand.

What could a child know about having an identity crisis or being ashamed of oneself? What would a little girl know about self-loathing such as this? And what could a child know about good and evil?

Nothing, of course. And sharing that—even if it just barely skimmed the surface—with her had been a silly thing to do.

And so he got to his feet, deciding that he might as well keep looking for the goddamn egg. After all, the faster he found it, the faster he'd get Raleigh home. The day wouldn't be a complete loss in that case.

Stupid Midgardian holidays.

Jo looked up at him, squinting to block out the bright midday sun, and said, "I don't think you're bad, Luke."

Loki stopped, caught off guard by the innocence and pure naïveté of the statement. _I don't think you're bad._ He was many things: a Prince, a sorcerer, a Frost Giant, a traitor, a criminal, a murderer, but _not bad_ was certainly not one of those things. Good was Thor's territory, it always had been.

"Well," Loki said curtly as he held out a hand to the little girl, "I don't suppose that you would—you're just a kid, so what would you know about any of it?"

Jo's face clouded over with determination as she accepted his hand and he pulled her to her feet. "Mommy says that there's no one out there who is all bad. Everybody has some good in them. So that means that you _can't_ be bad, Luke."

"No, that simply means that I can't be _all_ bad," Loki told her sourly. He was beginning to lose his patience with the child. This was stupid.

"So then you have to _choose_ to listen to the good part of you," Jo said, her tone bordering on condescension if it were possible. "Lupin had bad in him and he was still a good guy."

Loki's eyes narrowed. He knew the child was merely parroting what Mariah had taught her, but still—it annoyed him. It bothered him. And it wasn't because it was faulty logic.

It was because she—or rather, Mariah—was right.

He was loathe to admit it and there was a part of him, a very petty part of him at that, which wanted nothing more than to debate the little girl on matters such as fate and destiny. What if you were _born_ to be evil? What if being bad was your _fate?_ Could you change that with a simple choice? What choice could possibly overpower the natural forces of the universe?

If he was made to be bad, to be evil, then no amount of _choosing_ to listen to the angel on his shoulder would change that. He would always go back to what he was. He would always return to square one. He would always be a monster, a freak, an outcast, a traitor. He would always be the unloved son, the less favoured son, the unfortunate Prince.

"What do you think makes people choose to listen to the good parts of themselves?" Loki finally asked her as they walked—Jo's hand snugly in his—toward the tree line to check the low hanging branches for any eggs that were hidden away in the nooks and crannies of the trees.

"Mom says that you have to be nice to people so that they pass it on," Jo replied. "You're supposed to treat people like you want to be treated and you're supposed to love yourself. So if you love somebody, they're gonna love you back and they're gonna be good to you."

Of course. It always circled back to love.

Loki wanted to roll his eyes, but again he found himself thinking that just maybe Mariah was right. The idea, even if it was a bit messy from being recycled by a child, was well thought out and it was well-reasoned.

Involuntarily, he found himself glancing backwards and over his shoulder at where Raleigh was searching for egg 49.

He'd promised himself that he would try to be good—to be _better_—for her.

Damn it.

"Maybe," Loki conceded with a heavy sigh.

"Mom says it's true," Jo insisted with a little shrug of her narrow shoulders. Suddenly her eyes widened and she flung her arm out, pointing upwards. "Look, Luke!"

He followed where she was pointing and caught sight of the light yellow egg sitting quite snugly in the space between the trunk of the nearest tree and one of the lower hanging branches. With a smile, he looked down at the little girl, and asked, "Do you suppose that's it?"

"Luke, come _on!"_ she cried, pulling on his hand with so much force that her purple wicker basket threatened to spill over.

Laughing, Loki led her over to the tree where the egg had been hidden. He reached for the egg when a sudden realisation struck him and he found himself turning back to Jo. "Would you like to get it?" he asked her.

"Yeah, but I'm too short," she said, looking crestfallen.

"I'll pick you up," he told her.

Jo's face brightened. "Really?!" Loki nodded. "Okay!"

Carefully resting his hands on the little girl's waist, he lifted her into the air and turned to face the tree. He watched in silence as she reached out, plucking the egg from its resting place, before she inspected it curiously.

"I got it!" she cried excitedly. "I got it, Luke! It's 49!"

"Well done," he replied as he set her back down. He smiled at Raleigh as he caught sight of her making her way through the bushes to come and see Jo's discovery.

"Raleigh, I got it! Luke and I got it!" Jo was practically jumping up and down as she spoke. "I won!"

"That's great!" Raleigh said, grinning at her. She took the egg when Jo held it out to her, inspecting it and checking to be sure that it definitely was 49. When she'd finished looking (and confirming) at egg 49, she handed it back to Jo and asked, "Do you want to go show your mum?"

"Yeah!" Jo nodded.

"We'll go with you," Raleigh said, motioning for the little girl to start ahead and lead their way to Steve and Mariah. When she'd gone ahead, Raleigh took Loki's hand, laced her fingers through his, and said, "You were really good with her."

"Children aren't exactly difficult to deal with," Loki replied as they followed after Jo.

"Ah," Raleigh said, rolling her eyes. "The well-mannered ones are always easy to deal with. It's the naughty ones that are difficult; you should be able to sympathise."

He chuckled. "I was a very good child."

"Oh please," Raleigh laughed, bumping her shoulder against his, "You've told me plenty about the stuff you'd get up to as a kid. Lighting the training arena instructor's hair on fire, filling the maid's buckets with snakes so that they'd scream and run, changing the colour of your teacher's robes so that they were transparent, but he could't tell? That's pretty naughty stuff."

"I was a highly intelligent and very bored little boy," Loki said simply.

"Well, at least I openly admit to having been a shitty kid," Raleigh said. "This one time, Susan came down for Easter and she brought Ben and I baskets of chocolate," she recalled. "Ben and I hated this bulldog she had, Rouger I think she named it, and so we decided to feed it all of our chocolate. Dad caught me unwrapping a truffle and he just about skinned Ben and I for even thinking it was all right to do that."

Loki's brow furrowed. "I scared and embarrassed people and you tried to kill your aunt's dog with the sweets that she gave you. I think that there is a very big difference in naughtiness here."

Raleigh flushed and hung her head in shame. "I feel awful every time I think about it," she admitted. "And Ben loves dogs. He's been begging to get one for years now and I think Susan is looking at bulldogs with him."

"Do you not like them?" Loki asked, glancing up at Jo as she wound her way through a herd of children and continued across the open field toward where her mother waited.

"I like them," Raleigh said, "and I want one eventually. They say that if you can raise a dog, you can raise a kid."

"Then I suppose I would be a fine parent," he said. "I've had several over the years. They're good animals—loyal, smart, protective. They're not so difficult if you have a firm hand with them."

"So if the kid is whining and wants ice cream, but hasn't finished its dinner, what do you do?" Raleigh asked him challengingly.

"Tell it no."

"But it won't stop whining and it's getting really annoying."

"Tell it no and that it'll be sent to its rooms."

"Oh you are so full of it!" Raleigh cried. "You'd give it the ice cream if it would make it shut up—no, don't try to deny it! I know you, Luke. I know you and I know that you like to solve problems quickly! You'd spoil our children!"

He stopped walking and wrenched his gaze away from Jo. _"Our_ children?"

Raleigh flushed, obviously realising her err. "Sorry, I just…I didn't think."

"Is there something you need to tell me?" he asked her quite seriously; his eyes darted to her middle. "Did you forget a pill?"

"No, no!" She shook her head. "Don't be ridiculous. I take it every day. I just, I don't know, I wasn't thinking I guess and it just slipped out."

He relaxed, but still felt the need to clarify: "So you're not pregnant?"

"Definitely not," she said, and he breathed a sigh of relief. "I just had my period last week, remember?"

"How could I not?" he asked teasingly. "You only woke me up and begged to go to McDonald's at half past midnight together."

"Oh, shut up," Raleigh said, before glancing at Jo. The little girl had found Mariah and Steve, and was proudly showing them her find. "Do you actually want kids? Serious question."

"Maybe in another thousand years," Loki shrugged. "They smell odd."

"So do you," she remarked, earning a dirty look. "You were really good with her."

He snorted. "Only because I was imagining all of the lascivious things I would do to you after I found the stupid egg."

She rolled her eyes. "How mature."

"It worked."

"Mm." She looked over at him and asked, "So what did you have in mind?"

"I hardly believe that's a conversation we should be having in front of children."

Her lips curled into a smile. "No, I suppose not," she said. And then, more coquettishly, "What do you say we go home and dye some eggs of our own?"

* * *

Several hours later, they still lay together in bed. Raleigh's head rested on his bare chest, her eyes half closed, and she traced circles on his skin with the nail of her pinky finger.

Loki's eyes were closed as he rested while his arms were wrapped tightly around the dark haired woman. Her body curved against this own, radiating warmth both above and below the sheets that were tangled around their legs.

"So what did you think of Easter?" she asked, breaking their silence.

"I much prefer St. Patrick's Day," he answered, opening his eyes. He lifted his hand and threaded his fingers through her hair gently before adding, "The chocolate was nice, though."

She chuckled. "Just the chocolate?"

"Oh, and that thing you did," he murmured, "that was nice, too."

"Ah," she said, snuggling closer to him.

"Ah?"

"Mm-hm." His fingers tightened in her hair, pulling on it, which prompted her to twist around in his arms so that she could see his face. "What?!"

"What do you mean by 'ah'?" he asked her.

Raleigh's grin was sly. "Nothing really, it's just I was right—you didn't last five minutes."

* * *

**Author's Note:**

_I've been a bit busy with life for the last couple of weeks (work, family, friends, my s/o, etc.) but I'll be back with my regularly scheduled broadcast of Counting Stars sometime soon. :) _

_Thanks for reading! Reviews are my sunshine on a cloudy day._


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